Ten Things You Can’t Fake

George Keller once said, “To think creatively, we must be able to look afresh at what we normally take for granted.” So what do you think is on the top ten list of what you can’t fake? I just gave away a big hint. As for the other nine, well, that’s up to you to shout some back.

But here’s where the ‘Annie’ thought process is going this morning – it’s probably the most valuable lesson I brought away from the first #gardenblogconf. Can you guess what it is? It’s on my top ten things of what you can’t fake. It seems intuitive and commonsense but you can’t fake creativity.

So bouncing to the next thought – is anyone asking why the well-established print media (which most think to be dead or close to it) are being bought by some pretty well-known business moguls? Let’s hope for something called integrity coming  back to any form of media as we entrench ourselves in a cyberspace world where ‘it’s very easy to take other people’s stuff without a conscience or give due credit where credit is due.’

So here is another great point taken away from the conference by one of its speakers, @seasonalwisdom - to ‘keep moving forward.’ Seems pretty straightforward (pardon the pun) but this is precisely where creativity and original content come from. It’s not from those chugging behind, picking up leftover crumbs in the garden dust.

It was said in the early days of the Internet (which seems so many moons ago) that the government and its agency (U.S. Copyright office) would not be able to keep up with this breakneck pace. Fast forward to what’s a raging flood of social media giving way to a very shaky platform of social etiquette. Time to get some social manners.  As @urbangardens suggested at the conference, we need to talk about this issue, especially since it isn’t going away anytime soon.

Okay so there's just one more tidbit of inspiration to share from the conference. Besides her funny and unique delivery, it's a point to note - @Gardenrant does have a voice with the big boys. It was her unique and creative writing that crafted an important social media point.

So that's it in a nutshell - be genuine, not an imposter. With that, even with this welcome back, choppy thought process, I’ll end with one more of the top ten you can’t fake - a smile! Give someone next to you a huge one but make sure it’s real. It’s amazing what it does!

P.S. Note to self from conference – get the Youtube channel active. Great first video to come!

Image by Ann Bilowz ©

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